A history of postal agitation from fifty years ago till the present day. H. G. Swift
on the departure of the dukely pseudo-philanthropist from St. Martin’s-le-Grand. If there was one thing in postal administration during this time which called for praise it was the earnest solicitude after the health of the staff. The earlier reports from the medical officers of the Post-Office are examples of completeness, and display a patience, a research, and a suggestiveness, as well as a desire to improve the sanitary conditions and working environments of the staff, which is all the more creditable, seeing that the Post-Office then employed only a tithe of the vast army which to-day crowd and toil within its walls.
Yet, painstaking and conscientious as these annual reports on the health of the staff continued to be for the first few years of their appearance, they were by virtue of their very quality calculated to mislead the public as to the inner conditions of Post-Office life. For one thing they referred principally, if not wholly, to the staffs of London; occasionally Edinburgh and Dublin and other large centres came in for observation, but generally speaking too little attention was paid to the conditions of the provincial offices and other places. Extensively quoted and commented on as all such reports were likely to be, they helped, despite the good intentions of their authors, to convey a lasting impression that the Post-Office was the best-managed and best-regulated department of the State, second only to the army in point of immunity from liability to disease in sanitation and general healthful surroundings. They conveyed the idea that the authorities were on the whole so solicitous about the health and comfort of their lesser subordinates that they would temper the wind to the shorn lamb, and were only too eager to stand between a postman and a draught even while they resolutely refused him proper boots and a winter overcoat. They conveyed the notion that while it was good for his moral welfare to underpay him and put temptation in his way, they none the less themselves endured sympathy pains each time an epidemic of diarrhœa swept through the office. They might be found guilty of many things, but it could never be urged against them that they neglected to regulate the number of microbes in the drinking-water. Altogether such regard apparently was paid to the health of the postal staff in these earlier reports that they gave a suggestion of an abiding humanitarianism in postal administration which should cause postal officials generally to regard themselves as fortunate indeed. Only the timidly-uttered discontent among the letter-carriers gave indication of that newly-imported spirit of profit-mongering commercialism which in a few years was to debauch that leavening principle almost beyond recognition. Not that there was any conscious hypocrisy as yet in officialdom. Through all the changes that ensued, the authorities acted according to their conception of their moral duty. For, up to the present, no responsible minister had risen to accuse the Government of being the model employer.
Rowland Hill, the Permanent Secretary, who by this time had become petted and praised and honoured as the greatest reformer of his or any other age, was nevertheless beginning to be found out by his humbler subordinates. Among them at least the “Monarch of the Penny Post” was anything but a living embodiment of all human virtues. These, the little army of obscure minions about the footstool of his gilded throne, had found out that the idol had feet of clay. While the crowd worshipped without, the menial servants within the temple dedicated to his fame could not seal their eyes to his imperfections. They were the menials on whose humble shoulders was borne the weight of that throne and footstool on which he rested; and they most of all knew that their worshipful master’s clay foot was one that could crush most mercilessly. Such was the feeling under the surface, while the great postal reformer himself never dreamed that those so low down would dare to question either his wisdom or his benevolence in finding employment for such a class of men as they. If he ever dreamed that menials could prove so ungrateful for his inventing the penny post, which gave them their livelihood whatever the conditions, it is probable he did not care. Had he been curious to find out, like another Al Raschid, how his servants regarded him, he would have found it somewhat difficult. But suddenly one day, in the summer of 1858, there was circulated broadcast among the members of the London postal service a stinging piece of satire in verse, which purported to represent the esteem in which he was held by the rank and file of the working staff. There is not the slightest doubt that means were taken to ensure his getting a copy, even if his own cherished penny post were used as the medium. If Rowland Hill ever saw it, history is silent as to how he took it. Possibly he only smiled contemptuously; certainly he was not the man to wince, because the sting of an insect had found a loose joint in his armour. Needless to say the author never came forward to claim his laurels, nor was his anonymity discovered. The verse, which was printed on a small handbill, convenient for secret distribution, is almost a literary curiosity now after nearly fifty years. It read as follows:—
THE WHITE SLAVES
To the Magnate of St. Martin’s-le-Grand
The author presents his compliments to Mr. Rowland Hill, and begs his acceptance of the accompanying lines as a mark of the respect in which he is held by a numerous and hard-working class of which the writer is one, as
A Post-Office Fag, Versus White Nigger.
O Rowland Hill! O Rowland Hill!
Thou man of proud imperious will!
Forbear to crush, with iron hand,
The drudges under thy command;
And strive to purify thy fame
From stains that now defile thy name.
Hast thou all sense of justice lost,
Great Monarch of the Penny Post?
Thou takest care, O Rowland Hill!
Thy own big-bellied purse to fill;
But woe betide the hapless wight,
If thou canst nibble at his mite.
Is not thy service rather dear,
At fifteen hundred pounds a year?
Thy brother, with a thousand too,
Methinks is pretty well to do:
And then thy Son, that hopeful sprig,
Five hundred hath to laugh and jig.
So thou hast feathered well thy nest,
And now canst giggle with the best.
But sometimes, Rowland! cast a thought,
On those by labour overwrought;
Nor crimp them of their scanty pay,
That thou mayst revel with the gay;
Invoke their blessing, not their curse,
And thou wouldst never fare the worse.
There is reason to believe that the lines were produced by the printers of the Civil Service Gazette. The lines gave an immense amount of secret satisfaction among the class of men to whom the poet was supposed to belong. But better was in store. Following almost immediately on the publication of the verse, the Civil Service Gazette announced its early intention to ventilate the grievances of the “Fags” and “White Niggers” of the postal service. Great was the jubilation among the aggrieved men, for each confidently expected to borrow a copy from his neighbour when it came out. The Civil Service Gazette was a luxury few could afford ordinarily in those days, costing as it did fivepence, principally owing to the paper duty not being yet repealed.
It was the very first time that any public organ had shown the courage and independence to take up in this manner the little-known case of the sorters and letter-carriers. They were naturally delighted, and devoured the articles with avidity. Now that their grievances had at last found ventilation in all the glory of print, surely the day of their deliverance was close at hand.
But the articles fell short of the mark. They were forcible and telling enough—as all such articles of the Civil Service Gazette in those days were—and they showed no small justification for the discontent prevailing. Yet they convinced nobody but the aggrieved men themselves; the authorities were scarcely impressed, except with the impudence of it, while they were read with only a qualified sympathy by the other members of the Civil Service who chanced to take them up. The only effect the publication of the articles had